Yule Goat visits the Foxes

Dear Blog,
This year Santa came by car.
He took my 55 euros and gave us e.g. Singstar microphones, a Barbapapa bag, Luke Skywalker Force Action Lightsaber and other necessities, which we had bought earlier.
Ho ho ho.


The Fox Blog wishes everyone happy holidays.
The return of the lazy blogger-commentwriter will happen next year.

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 24

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 23

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 22

Isolationist ambient music

Just when I thought the red line looked like so boring, I found this great Wikipedia Band Name Meme through Patroclus, who found it originally from Miss-Cellany's friend's friend's blog. Anyway, here are the rules:
Go to Wikipedia and click on random article in the left-hand navbar.
The first article title is your band name.
Click random article again and that is your album name.
Click random article yet again and again until you have found enough of album tracks.

Like this way:

Band Name: Lynge

Album Title: Boven-Leeuwen

Album Tracks:
1. Jackson County, Colorado
2. Palatine Chapel in Aachen
3. Arrondissement of Brioude
4. Shirone, Niigata
5. Smoky Hollow (neighborhood)
6. Asadata Dafora
7. WHTI (disambiguation)
8. Eucherius of Lyon
9. James Maxton
10.Siege of Kerak
11. Joomla!


Hmm. I kind of knew it. Total of two records sold.*


* well, given as gifts to cousins, but anyway

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 21

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 20

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 19

Click click clickety click.

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 18

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 17

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 16

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 15

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 14

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 13

Open

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 12

Open

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 11

Knock, knock...

Superlon Advent Calendar 2007 - Day 10

Superlon Mystery 1980 - Day 9

Oh, hello, welcome again.

Superlon Mystery Advent Calendar 1972 - Day 8

Welcome again

Superlon Mystery Advent Calendar 1971 - Day 7

Open, please

Superlon Mystery Advent Calendar Exclusively from the Future - Day 6

Open the door

Louder sigh

This is how I might sing, though...

Pipilotti Rist
original work Sip My Ocean

Superlon Advent Calendar 2008 - Day 5

OPEN

Superlon Advent Calendar - Day 4

Open the Door Four

Superlon Advent Calendar - Day 3

Open the Door

Superlon Advent Calendar - Day 2

Open the Door

Superlon Mystery Advent Calendar 2008

Big sigh

This is how I would want to sing, if I only could...

Sun!

In November!

[long baffled silence]




Oh no come with me to Helsinki
Where the streets are wide and so am I
Wide open for love
Any love from anyone

Well, not really, but consider watching this, though...
Italy vs Helsinki by a Swedish band Laakso

Typical Day of a Curator

Dear Blog,

Today I woke up at 6.55 am, went to work, wrote various e-mails to New York and Kopenhagen, piled some papers and stuff like I always do, looked out and thought that the work day must be over already, took my coat and noticed it was just 11 am.
Bloody November.
I wondered how are we supposed to know what time it is when it's equally dark outside days and nights. Obviously a clock would help, but I don't wear one, because I have a mobile. Well, I wasn't in a mood for seeing any mobiles today.

I went to the shop and bought a princess crown, came back to work and watched secrectly a piece of art, which I obviously shouldn't do at daytime, because I work in an art museum. I did some more paperwork and came back home when it was dark.
I thought I could possibly be more efficient and an overall better person if I'd sleep more. I also wondered that I probably wouldn't even try chasing a crazily meowing cat during nights if I'd sleep more, but obviosly I can't sleep because all that meowing. Perhaps I should get a meowlingual?



Cat: Meow!
Meowlingual: I want food!
T Fox: Would you be quiet, I want to sleep!
Cat: Meooow!
Meowlingual: I want foood!
T Fox: Shut up now!
Cat: Meeoow!
Meowlingual: I waaant food!

Perhaps not.

Sumerians didn't have nylon socks

I thought to write about my highly exciting life today.

Dear Blog,
Today I woke up when it was dark. I took lots of photocopies. I tried to choose right kind of paper for a book. I bought a new pair of gloves. I was back at home when it was dark. When the kids went to their beds I watched how the dog ate some tasty rabbit feces.

Well, probably not.
Even the news suddenly sounded too weird to be published in a serious and deeply thoughtful blog like this.
"Illegal alcohol underwater pipeline from Russia to Estonia shut down."
"Santas in Australia have been discouraged from saying "ho, ho, ho" because some feel it could scare children and offend women."*
"Used condoms are being recycled into hair bands in southern China."
"A naked man died after pulling a condom filled with laughing gas over his head."
"Man dies after getting stuck in girlfriend’s cat door."
"A house cat in southern England has a nightly routine of disappearing and awaiting a ride home at the same place 2 miles away every morning."

If I could understand some more Latin than vulpes vulpes, I could probably read the daily news in Latin, as many Finns do. Some of us even sing Elvis in Latin.
Apparently he can sing Blue Suede Shoes in Sumerian as well. "... it was difficult to find Sumerian equivalents for certain modern concepts and words. For example, the Sumerians of course didn't have nylon socks, so I had to improvise and made it "cotton boots," šuhub gu."

Was that deeply thoughtful enough?
Ok.
Then it's time to watch Indian Thriller.




* Of course everybody knows that real Santa doesn't say "ho,ho,ho". Santa says: "Onkos täällä kilttejä lapsia?"

What a Funwall World

[I took the awful video away]

A video called "Jokela high school massacre 11/7/2007" was posted on the YouTube website by an 18-year-old man, who waves at you on his training video above.

Whilst I was celebrating my Son's 7th birthday today, I read his thoughts: "Death and killing is not a tragedy... Not all human lives are important or worth saving."

It was a dark and stormy night

Few weeks ago, when it was a dark night, but without the northern November sea wind (like we had yesterday), I was walking outside with the dog. I passed familiar places and tried to think what to write about, but I felt bit down and forgotten, as I tend to do when autumn is nearly over and everything, even the nature, is desperately bare. I was thinking how lovely it was, just a month ago, to sit in shadow and enjoy cold Italian prosecco with the friends, playing the "which animal would you be" game.

Could that be a sensible topic, perhaps a new meme, I thought, but after a second thought I believed no-one would love to read this kind of dialogue:
Colleague 1: Let's play the "which animal would you be"-game.
T Fox: Ok. What animal would I be?
Collegues 1 & 2 & 3: A sebra.
T Fox: A sebra? What about if I'd be something not so scared and stripey. Some carnivore?
Collegues 1 & 2 & 3: A wolverine.
T Fox: Hmm...
Colleague 2: If you would be a car you'd be a really old Mercedes-Benz.
T Fox: Hey, that's not an animal!
Colleague 1: Would you be a cat or a dog?
T Fox: A cat.
Colleague 1: No, you would be a dog.
Colleagues 2 & 3: Definitely a dog.
T Fox: Ok, I admit. What kind of dog I'd be then? I'd like to be an Irish Setter.
Colleague 2: A pug.
Colleague 3: Are we ready to go now?

I was ready to go and plucked the dog back from the bush. Crappy idea, I thought and wondered how many ah-so-brilliant ideas I had had, but couldn't have written about them, because so much or nearly everything would have got lost in the translation.

Two about 12-year-old boys were standing on the top of the hill with their bikes.
We came closer.
Boy 1: "Noutaja" comes.
[Unauthorized translator: noutaja s 1 retriever kultainen noutaja golden retriever]
T Fox: [not aloud] Retriever? Don't they teach anything at school these days?
We come closer.
Boy 1: Didn't you hear? "Noutaja" comes.
T Fox: [not aloud] Yes, yes, I heard, are you stupid or something?
We come closer.
Boy 1: Now I'm starting to be scared. Do you want to have a taste of my knife?
T Fox: [not aloud] Shit!
[Unauthorized translator: noutaja s 2 Grim Reaper]

I think my dog looks too nice to be nearly a wolf. Should I get her a creepy outfit?

Jack Sparrow Dog Costume and many more here

Death of the Author and Other Thoughts of the Month

Today, whilst I was in Metro, reading Roland Barthes, it hit me. I had nearly forgotten the Fox. Well, not forgotten, but I had felt way too busy lately and everything had seemed so much more important than the blog. I wish I could have said I really had been that busy, but obviously I couldn't. You, who are on Facebook, you know that I could have written much and much and even some more and spent far less time on writing something more important than my status updates:

X is wondering if it is November making her feel like an ugli fruit. 8:30pm

X is a podgy bored pony-tailed pomelo. 4:14pm
X is a sodden ponderous toothless tooth fairy. 3:45pm

X is completely at sea. A frozen one. 9:38am

X is having gentle useless rants inside her head. 12:38am
X is having broken teeth and snow kind of a weekend. 8:34pm
X is suddenly aware it's November already. 7:07pm
X is writing again. 4:28pm
X is going to listen a lecture by Tate Modern's Exhibitions Registrar now. 1:15pm
X is trying to write. 9:53am
X is finally realising that she is a bookshopaholic. 12:20am
X is a Monopoly-loser. 9:36pm
X is boringly writing about some art stuff. 2:43pm
X is a worker. 11:39am

X is way too water-y. 12:26am

X is feeling Ikea-dizzy. 9:53pm

X is in a Tuesday tune. 1:06am
X is in a monday mode. 10:46am
X is at sleep. 1:19am

X is offline. 3:44pm

X is wearing a red nose. 2:36pm

X is going to visit the bookfair today. Yay! 10:52am

X is torpidly tired, but at work. 9:48am

X is ready for the spectacle. 6:47pm

X is mycket bättre after the buffé, wine and chocolate. 5:35pm

X is bad-tempered, not festive. 4:35pm

X is going to go to bed with a real book. 12:02am

X is drinking tea and building up a virtual bookshelf for the virtual self. 9:42pm

X is not working. 6:49pm

X is working working working not wanting but working. 3:23pm

X is feeling sick. 3:18pm

X is óleo, platos, bondo sobre lona impermeable verde. 3:08pm

X is stressed out. 1:57pm

X is working, working and working. 11:22am

X is sleepy. 11:54pm

X is almost back from the completely knackered state of mind. 8:58pm

X is completely knackered. 9:32pm

X is a happy owner of new shoes and feels better already. 8:17pm

X is exhausted, well beaten, run-down, washed-out and nearly dead. 4:05pm

X is argh. 12:37pm

X is apparently a some kind of a lawyer with a cleaner's salary. 12:07pm

X is beginning a new full week. 8:39am

X is asleep. 12:19am

X is unable to write except about the penguin pee and stuff like that. 11:51pm

X is done. Hooray. Hip hip hip hoo-ra...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. 8:02pm

X is working. Boring. 3:14pm

X is back from Ratatouille. 6:25pm

X is still thinking that the perry creme brûlée & cinnamon-orange sorbet was rather nice. 10:55am

X is apparently very invitation friendly this morning. 10:21am

X is at home again. 1:59am

X is trying to find her clothes. 5:38pm

X is at work and waiting for the evening and dinner. 9:23am

X is frozen, but fully amused. 12:20am

X is having presents and bubbly drinks before going to the amusement park. 4:01pm

X is frustrated. 8:31am

X is really happy for Y :). 11:50pm

X is not reading a text "Some Reflections on an Agonistic Approach to the Public.". 6:41pm

X is reading a text "Some Reflections on an Agonistic Approach to the Public". 9:15am

X is a worn-out worker. 8:43am

X is apparently a cheerful chipmunk. 11:54pm
X is writing nonsense. 11:48pm

X is definitely not up to something. 11:12pm

X is a cuddlemaster. 1:06pm

X is probably just way too optimistic. 12:20am

X is not sure actually. 12:17am

X is just happy. 12:13am

X is asked to play with her notepad instead of facebook. Hmph. 10:28pm

X is aware that her home is filled with beer, naked women and potatoes. 7:29pm

X is feeling dizzy. 1:30pm

X is looking after a strange fluffy toy. 12:36am

X is going to drink all the wine now, because she just got frozen outside. 8:48pm

X is having an Eastern European mole as a weekend guest and wonders if they drink red wine. 7:44pm
X is happy like a small horsey again. 12:03am

X is so exhausted, but happy. 4:33pm

X is going to work hard today. Seriously. 8:39am

X is going to light up the room. Well, the bedroom anyway. 12:06am

X is slush and whoosh. 9:23pm

X is a having a big mouth and no brain. 4:08pm

X is an ice-cream eating ice-cube. 11:04pm

X is an ice-cube. Also terribly lazy. 10:00pm

X is not going to change any bloody smitten tires with mittens anyway. 9:07pm

X is stupid smytten. 9:05pm

X is suddenly thinking about winter tyres and smittens. Depressing. 9:03pm

X is . 9:01pm

X is as much fun as a wall. 12:13am

Talking about walls:



origin here

I hope you found your answers from the Fox blog

I should have been working really hard today, so I had some time to look at the Statcounter. This is how some of you found your way here during the last two weeks.

- shepherdswell ghosts
- poisonous taiga
- "i hate sightseeing" (Top 1 on Google search. Yay!)
- i am a black poem in the book every eye ain't asleep by kojo
- youtube trying on my big red bra
- "floating shopping centre"
- danny slobodan milosevic
- yes I can't the tomorrow yes I can't the foxit ( top 1 again)
- Charlie Chaplin vegetarian
- buy victorian weightlifter moustache
- guinness porridge (another top 1)
- don't feed the animals yoghi (Top 1 in Italian Google search)
- trippy saying
- chubby russian (Top 10 in Czech Google search)
- i am a reindeer
- do penguins pee?

The weekend revisited, featuring Mole

The youngest member of the fox family started at his new daycare two months ago. Last week was his turn to be The Kid of the Week, which meant lots of fun, like having an interview about the future and looking at his cute baby photos surrounded by giggling girls. Well, things that every five year old boy loves to do.

On Friday the Mole visited us and stayed as a weekend guest. Yes, the famous Eastern European Krtek the Mole. He moved in, having only a flower patterned sleeping bag, a pillow and a diary with him. We were supposed to do things with him and write about it afterwards. I was slightly concerned about the whole thing. You know, I already imagined how it would read:
"The mole looked at how mother sat at the computer. Then he looked at how father sat at the computer. Then he looked at how the boys watched telly. Then the dog ate him."

So avoiding that, we were busy doing things. We ate healthy things like tomato soup. We saw a brilliant play called Detective Knot and the Mystery of the [something. I already forgot what it was... well it is a mystery now, but it had something to do with knots anyway and the bouncing sheep was great, so never mind] at the theater. We tried to clean up. We were at the birthday party and behaved well, even though it was bit boring and I had a feeling we were bunch of ghettoblasters sitting nicely between the Queen of Niederösterreich and a nervously shy Nobel prize winner. Later we looked closely at all the fossiles and bones inside the Geology museum's showcases. When we were driving the car we weren't annoyed at all when the Kid of the Week was constantly shouting "But I want to hear that song where they sing Yee Haw!" and we didn't know what the song was all about and we had to play a short inroduction of every song of every CD we had in our car, before we found out it wasn't a song about a donkey, but Julian Casablancas pronouncing the word here and we all laughed and listened to it thrice and I decided that he won't look at the video until he's 18, but he has to keep on watching his other favourite Honey Bee (Let's Fly to Mars) and he agreed.

On Sunday evening I wrote everything down. "How are you today, my dear friend Mole? Did you have a jolly good sleep?, asked A Fox (5)", I wrote and thought how nice it all sounded, indeed. Then I remembered I didn't have a clue what happened on Friday when I was still at work.
T Fox: What did you do with Kretk the Mole on Friday?
Mr Fox: We went to the shopping center.
T Fox: Oh, that's nice. What did you buy?
Mr Fox: A bottle of red wine.
T Fox: Oh.
Mr Fox: The mole carried it inside his sleeping bag. I took a photo of it for the diary.
T Fox: Great.

One kind of fox is alive, and has four legs and a head and a tail

Hmm...what to write about now, thinks the fox, after being way too long at her another home, which is now filled with beer, naked women and potatoes, but however much she thinks about everything, like why her beloved trousers are now officially dead and why are there animals like olms, she only writes that Paul Potts sings at the Finlandia Hall on June.

[Sigh] Italy [Sigh]

The dinner is served
Originally uploaded by Taiga the Fox.

Grotesque beauty


Pescatori al Pistacchio
Originally uploaded by Taiga the Fox.

Bakery


gondolier
Originally uploaded by Taiga the Fox.

Prosecco, Bellini, parmesan, panini


Cappuccino
Originally uploaded by Taiga the Fox.

Cappuccino


Gelatelli
Originally uploaded by Taiga the Fox.

Anguria gelatelli


Pasta for the Goths
Originally uploaded by Taiga the Fox.

That what made me have black teeth

Few flights and couple of blokes called Leinonen.

I don't particularly fancy flying. Even less now when I have booked flights from KLM. I read their website which proudly announced: "You can choose from the following special meals:
* Vegetarian
* Fruit
* Asian vegetarian
* Strict vegetarian
* Babies
* Children
* Diabetes mellitus
* Cardiovascular disease or elevated cholesterol
* High blood pressure
* Gluten free
* Lactose free
* Muslim
* Kosher
* Hindu "

What I apparently couldn't understand was the word intercontinental, so I booked the flights and only later found out that they serve only basic catering meals on European flights. I seriously thought if I really should get a flight to USA and back on my way to Italy, but then I remembered this beautifully creepy sight and decided that I probably wouldn't like the taste of Diabetes mellitus anyway.

Well, later that day I was delighted about the shade of the skies.



If you visit Helsinki when I'm away, you should visit Taidetuunaamo by an artist Leinonen.
The words "Katso tuunausvideot" means "look at the tuning videos".

Also, later that day I was invited to a secret party, ate a secret cake, drank a secret coffee, didn't taste the ingredients of a secret bottle, but saw a secret singer called Leinonen.



Here is he singing about something small and warm [pieni ja lämpöinen]. You can learn the lyrics whilst I'm swimming in Laguna Veneta.

Have you seen Futuro?

I've been ill for three days now and stayed at home, doing much nothing. What is worst in flu, is that you can't really go out or do anything you'd just like to do. Like having a long bicycle ride to the neighbouring city. Tomorrow, when I could probably do it, I might not be interested anymore. [Ok, remove the might.] Also, what is terrible in flu, is that you really can't see any people, even if you'd finally have time for it. I tried to call few friends, but apparently all my friends had a shopping day yesterday. I knew there is Buy Nothing Day , but why didn't anybody tell me if there was also an annual world wide Let's All Go Shopping Except That One With The Flu Day?



So I stayed inside the house and did a shopping list called To Buy When Having a Completely Different Style.

1 Screw Table by Eero Aarnio



1 Sven Lundh's Eyeball



1 Mae West Lips Sofa




Some Polka Jam Orkestra Clothes









1 Futuro Home



But where to find that? I have seen one in late 70s. It was an Ufo Café in a small village called Luumäki (translates as Bonehill). Have you seen any?

How to mingle?

Few days ago my friend told me he is bit worried that he just don't get small talk at all. I'm probably not the best person to give that kind of advice, but let me tell you a Finnish joke instead:

Two guys, let's call them Jukka and Pekka, meet after a long time apart and they go to a sauna to have "one" beer. They drink vodka for a couple of hours. Pekka asks how Jukka has been doing. Jukka says nothing, but continues drinking for a couple of hours. Then, slowly, he replies: "Did we come here to babble, or did we come here to drink?"



(My favourite Kaurismäki clip)

This is an ad-free blog

so if you wonder why I added one, I have my own cow in the ditch (as we say, don't ask me why), because they published two of my photos. So if you want to look at some sights of Helsinki, there are some, I suppose.

the possibility of impossibility

Today I saw such an odd and clever show: French Circus group Collectif AOC's "Question de Directions".
What I can say?
It was like David Lynch and Charlie Chaplin films live on trampoline.
(They said it bit better in Guardian some time ago.)


circus
Originally uploaded by Taiga the Fox.